Ung Vänster, the youth organisation of the Swedish left
party (1), has made a donation to the Popular Front for the Liberation
of Palestine (PFLP) in order to challenge its inclusion on the
EU's proscribed terrorist organisations list.

Banning support for the PFLP

On 18 June 2002, the Council of the EU made a second update
to the list which bans financial transactions with specific groups
and individuals. The amendment was adopted by "written procedure",
where the text is simply circulated among the governments and
agreed unless there is any objection. The PFLP, the Palestine
Liberation Front (PLF) and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of
Colombia (FARC) were included for the first time with another
five groups based outside of the EU. To protest against the inclusion
of the PFLP, Ung Vänster organised a collection and transferred
the 2750 SEK raised (£200 / 300 euros) through an account
used by aid organisation Emmaus Bjorka for humanitarian
work in the Shatila refugee camp in Lebanon. The organisation
has long cooperated with the PFLP on a project to support Palestinian
widows in Shatila. Ali Esbati, chairman of the Young Left, said
the donation was being made to highlight:

The fact that EU can add or remove organisations on the
list, without anything specific having happened, is arbitrary
and clearly demonstrates its political character.

In July, Christer Johansson, chair of Emmaus and Christer
Ascher, a board member and well known paediatrician, met with
the Swedish government to discuss their donation and attempt
to clarify their legal liability. They explained that the PFLP
was part of a legitimate resistance movement in an occupied land
and that its right to armed struggle against military occupation
is recognized in international law. Emmaus is demanding
the removal of the PFLP from the list, though the organisation
will not challenge the law in the courts for fear of jeopardizing
its other foreign aid projects.

How the EU list is drawn-up

Johansson and Ascher were told that no group "can be
put on the list for political reasons", but that "ministers
in the Council do make a political assessment before taking a
decision". The interior ministry representatives said that
one motivation was the PFLP's assassination of Israeli tourism
minister Rehavam Zeeviin Autumn last year. Johansson
and Ascher suggest that if such criteria were applied consistently,
Israel "would be top of the list" (2).

Mattias Håkansson, a Swedish journalist, followed up
the issue of why the PFLP had been included with a series of
questions to Anders Kruse, head of judicial matters at the Swedish
foreign ministry. Mr. Kruse said that the Swedish government
was not prepared to discuss the reasoning behind the decision:

"This is a standpoint of principle. Behind the decision
are ongoing investigations and other information that cannot
be made public... There are criteria listed, and the Council
is following those. However we cannot make public the background
information of the decisions, and we do not wish to account for
how we were given the information."

Neither would he confirm whether or not investigations concerning
either FARC or the PFLP were actually taking place. It was then
put to him that the inclusion of PFLP and FARC had been discussed
before the EU's terrorist list was previously updated in May
2002, though again Mr. Kruse would not confirm this. Asked "what
has happened since May requiring the addition of these organisations
to the list and the removal of five people connected with ETA?",
he replied:

"Now I may be skating on thin ice, but you could say
that they were removed because the purpose of including them
had been achieved, and that is to create judicial and political
pressure in the Member state."

Mr. Kruse was then asked about the non-binding declaration
made by the EU Member States when adopting the recent Framework
Decision on Terrorism. It reads:

It has to be understood... and cannot be construed so as
to argue that the conduct of those who have acted in the interest
of preserving or restoring these democratic values, as was notably
the case in some Member States during the Second World War, could
now be considered as "terrorist" acts. Nor can it be
construed so as to incriminate on terrorist grounds persons exercising
their legitimate right to manifest their opinions, even if in
the course of the exercise of such right they commit offences.

He confirmed that the Council of the EU has not given any
thought to this principle when proscribing organisations:

"In the specific decision, there is no such discussion.
At an early stage there is knowledge about what could be done,
or what can be agreed on."

Will the illegal donation be prosecuted?

Although the donation by the Young Left to the PFLP clearly
breaches EU law, much confusion met Håkansson'sattempts
to find how it could be prosecuted under Swedish law, or even
if a case would be brought. The situation is complicated by a
new law that entered into force at the end of June which provides
for up to six years of punishment imprisonment for those who
give financial support to certain criminal acts. But the definitions
of terrorism are not the same as in either the EU Framework Decision
or in the Council's list of proscribed organisations. Thomas
Grahn, head of operations at the Swedish financial inspection
authority, suggests:

"The new law is simple. In order for a money transfer
to be prosecuted, there must be a clear connection to the planned
support of serious criminal actions."

Consequently, he suggests that the new law is unlikely to
be applied, although Sweden is still bound by EU law and a 1996
Swedish law on implementing international sanctions. However,
this law was designed to support the sanctions regime of the
mid-1990s and was geared toward action against countries rather
than individuals - though since its express aim is Swedish compliance
with UN and EU measures it supposedly obliges Sweden to deal
with any domestic actions in breach of those sanctions. Conversely,
in the recent al-Barakaat case, where Swedish citizens
were included on the UN and EU proscribed lists and then openly
supported by the public (see below), prosecutors took no action
on the grounds that the giving of money was motivated by humanitarian
interest and not of committing a crime. Theoretically, both the
1996 and 2002 laws could be used to prosecute the PLFP donation.

Last Thursday (12 September) there was an announcement from
Hans Ihrman of Stockholm's international prosecution chamber
that an investigation had been opened. Al Esbati, chair of the
Young Left, will be questioned next Tuesday (23 September) and
welcomes the legal action.

"The EU decisions are producing a Kafkaesque situation
and I hope that more people will react."

al-Barakaat

The PFLP donation is the second strong challenge in Sweden
to the implementation of the international sanctions regime in
the "war on terrorism". Last November, at the request
of the US, the UN Taleban Sanctions Committee added a number
of individuals and organisations to an existing list of those
whose assets should be frozen and financial transactions forbidden.
This UN Resolution was later applied across the EU under an EC
financial regulation. Three Swedish citizens of Somali origin
were included because of their work with al-Barakaat,
the major "hawala" bank, or money transfer organisation,
used by Somali people in exile in order to send money to their
relatives at home. Since the normal banking system in Somalia
collapsed in the early 1990's, around two thirds of the money
transferred to Somalia is sent through al-Barakaat.

The Swedish government decided to comply with the UN sanctions
immediately and froze the assets of the three men in November.
This was met with widespread public criticism and a campaign
urged people to oppose the order and give money to a quickly
formed solidarity committee. More than 300,000 SEK (£22,000
/ 33,000 euros) was eventually raised in order to provide for
the basic needs of the three.

Slow to react to the public criticism, it was six weeks before
the Swedish government began diplomatic contacts with the US
in January. Lawyers for the three men met with the European Commission,
the European Parliament and UN Committee on Human Rights and
also lodged a case at the European Court. At no time throughout
the affair has the US presented any evidence or specific accusations
against the three men. To have their names removed from the lists
they were ultimately forced to sign a statement to US authorities
that they have never been or ever will be involved in the support
of terrorism and would immediately cease all contacts with al-Barakaat.
A joint request from Sweden and the US to the UN Sanctions Committee
then resulted in a decision to remove their names at the end
of August. The European Commission followed suit several weeks
later and the three men have access to their financial assets
again.

The government's handling of the case was discussed by the
Committee of Constitution in the Riksdag (Swedish parliament),
which concluded that although it should have reacted much earlier
- and at the very least asked questions before implementing the
UN and EU sanctions - the government could not not really have
acted much differently because of its obligations under international
law.

The Swedish government has since made a number of public claims
that judicial safeguards should be built into the application
of the EU lists. In July, Anna Lindh, Foreign Affairs Minister,
called for clear criteria and the condition that there should
be at least a preliminary investigation demonstrating the connection
to terrorism before individuals or organisations could be included
in the list. Henry Ascher of Emmaus is calling for a wider campaign:

"As a citizen, you have to at least know the rules
of the game. It is hardly coherent with a democratic judicial
system that the accused should prove his innocence. This new
usage of law can only be compared to witch-hunts."

Notes

(1) Ung Vänster is the youth organisation
of the Vänsterpartiet and with 14,000 members is the second
largest youth organisation of the political parties in Sweden.
Following the recent elections, the Vänsterpartiet (Left
Party) is the fourth largest in the Swedish parliament.

(2) Rehavam Zeevi was assassinated by the
PFLP in October 2001. In claiming responsibility, the group said
it was a response to the assassination of PFLP head Abu Ali Mustafa
by the Israeli state in August 2001.

This report is based on a series of articles by Mattias
Håkansson for Swedish newspaper, FlammanE-mail: mattias.hakansson@flamman.se